


and i will understand (now and then)

by maremote



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Destiel - Freeform, M/M, Songfic, Suicidal Thoughts, cases
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-10
Updated: 2018-11-10
Packaged: 2019-08-21 16:34:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16580117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maremote/pseuds/maremote
Summary: Dean isn’t sure when it started.But at some point, Cas started paying more attentionIt strikes Dean then, all of a sudden. how far Cas has come. .





	and i will understand (now and then)

Dean isn’t sure when it started. 

But at some point, Cas started paying more attention

It strikes Dean then, all of a sudden. how far Cas has come. . 

Not just to cases, and to Sam, and Dean, and Claire, but to everything. He didn’t have Dean’s war-worn weariness, but he was careful.

The first time Dean realizes it, Cas is leaning on the Impala outside the bunker, staring off into the distance. Dean needs a little space from Sam, and the bunker, and reality for various reasons, and stops short when he sees Cas leaning against Baby, lost in thought. 

It strikes Dean then, all of a sudden. how far Cas has come. The angel had stormed into their lives practically humming with superiority and power, impervious and oblivious to anything beyond the burdens of him and his superiors. Even those he flicked aside flippantly, with no thought spared for consequences and catastrophe and petty mortals. Even his  _objectives,_  for Chuck’s sake, were assigned to him by a force he neither knew nor cared to know; he had an overall air of detachment from life, from himself, that made him seem like less of an individual character and more of a tool, a machine, a means to some dastardly ends. 

It was a good change, Dean reflected, for the rest of them at least. Having such a powerful being with a disregard for human life on the loose would be a disaster; then he immediately felt guilty for thinking of Cas as nothing more than a weapon. He shifted on the gravel, suddenly self-conscious; and the rough soles of his shoes, scraping against the gravel, drew Cas’s eyes sharply away from the horizon. A queer little pang worked its way through Dean’s heart as he met Cas’s eyes, and he swallowed. There was something about the sharpness, about the startled nature of the moment that made him feel uneasy, to say the least.

“Hello, Dean,” and Dean wanted to laugh. Just as Dean was thinking about how much Cas had changed. “Hey, Cas,” he ventured, wandering over to where Cas was standing and leaning on the car beside him. “What’s on your mind?”

Cas hummed, but didn’t answer.

Dean tilted his head. All right. It had been a pretty personal question, after all.

“I’m going for a drive,” Dean said suddenly. Then, to his own surprise: “Wanna come?”

Cas squinted, then nodded.

Dean didn’t have anywhere in particular in mind. He just drove. Cas seemed find with that. He just stared out the window, and though it was on the tip of Dean’s tongue to ask what he was thinking about again, he sensed that in Cas’s current pensive mood, the question would be far from welcome.  He managed to hold his tongue, until at last the silence in the car grew unbearable and he reached across to grab a cassette to shove in the car’s player. 

Just as he was about to slip the tape into the Impala, Cas spoke. “Do you ever think-,” he started, then cut himself off. 

Dean slipped the cassette back in the box and braced his hands against the wheel. “Do I ever think- what?” He glanced over at Cas, then looked back out over the road. The asphalt was dry and cracked, and the woods looked washed-out and faded. 

“Do you ever wonder what it’s all for?”

Something in Dean twisted painfully at the question.  _Did he ever._  He tried to keep the tone light as he answered. “Pretty dangerous thinking, Cas,” he said, turning down a slightly narrower street. Cas turned his head to look at Dean thoughtfully, and Dean instantly knew he hadn’t fooled him. He laughed softly, and Cas frowned. 

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing,” Dean said. “Nothing. It’s just… you. You’re so… different. And not in a bad way,” he added hastily, because Cas was getting that kicked-puppy look. (And wasn’t that a marvel, him describing an incredibly powerful being as a kicked puppy.) “It’s just… when you came here you were all… invulnerable, impenetrable exterior and insulting without even trying and just…. intrusive, you know?” He looked back at Cas briefly, but Cas’s eyes are on the road. 

“It’s like this,” he says. “You were sharp and you sort of pricked everyone whose lives you blazed through, and now you’re more rounded at the edges. You’re softer- in a good way. You’re- damnit, Cas, I don’t know.”

There was silence for a moment, and then Cas spoke. “I think I understand. But that doesn’t answer my question.”

“Well, like I said, that’s some pretty dangerous thinking, Cas. Once you get into that kind of debate, it’s pretty hard to come out unscathed.”

They both fell silent, until something occurred to Dean. “Why do you ask, anyways?”

Cas shrugged. Dean turns down another road and realizes he’s circled back to the bunker again. He pulls to a stop in front of it, but doesn’t get out. Cas doesn’t move either. 

“I suppose,” Cas said after a beat, “that I never really took the time to think about things. And now there’s just so much to think about, and I- I-,”

Cas faltered and fell silent, and Dean looked across at him, looking heartbreakingly human and soft and worn, like old leather, like an old trench coat no one seems to be able to let go of, the light shining through the windows of the car and dashing across his skin. He had a sudden urge to reach out and touch and had to settle for taking Cas’s hand. Cas’s head darted up, surprised, and he looked curiously at Dean’s hand. 

He wrapped his fingers around Dean’s wrist, almost experimentally, and Dean can’t help a little smile. “You didn’t used to notice any of this stuff, did you?” he asked. “And now you notice everything.”

Cas looks up at him and nods. “Precisely. I notice the sun, and the ground, and the grass, and the trees, and colors…,” he trailed off, then reached out a hand with no shyness whatsoever and brushed a thumb carefully along Dean’s cheek, their faces painfully close. “I notice minute details, like your freckles. There are so many of them.” 

Cas frowned, examining Dean’s face carefully with that stupid little pout, and Dean didn’t move because if he did he’d almost certainly just kiss the idiot. 

Then Cas lowered his hand, and turned to look out the front window. “Thank you for the drive, Dean,” he said. “It was very enjoyable.”

He got out of the car and shut the door behind him, and Dean slumped over the wheel, trying to catch his breath. 


End file.
